Giving a baby a bath is more difficult than you might think. I sort of snickered in the hospital when they gave us our lesson on bathing her. Truth be told, that wasn't the hard part. The hard part, in our house, was finding the right spot for baths.When she was tiny and still getting sponge baths, those were done on the counter in the bathroom. We are fortunate to have an extra long counter top. When the umbilical stump finally fell off and I could fully bathe her, I broke out the bath seat and decided to try the kitchen sink. She hated it. Of course it could be that she just hated baths in general, but I think it has something to do with the way her seat set up out of the water letting her get cold. After two attempts at that with her screaming so much she made herself sick, I decided to try another approach.
I tried bathing her in our master bath tub. It's a big garden tub. It was a disaster. Even with the handy kneeling stool a friend gave me, my back and knees ached in about two minutes. Plus, it was really hard to reach her. I think she sensed my frustration and hated it too. I could have tried the guest bath, but there is kitty litter in that floor most of the time and I don't want to deal with that. I knew there had to be another option.
Finally, I arrived at a wonderful solution. I would get in our big tub with Lily. What a revolution that has been. She loves having mommy in there splashing around with her. She smiles, laughs, splashes, and even tries to drink the bath water. It's also super easy for me to reach her, heck, sometimes I even hold her on my lap and let her sink deep into the water. She loves it. The only tricky part is getting in and out of the tub, but usually Josh is around to help with that.
So, for all you moms (and dads) out there struggling to figure out bath time. Try the co-bath...it's fun for all!
